Rich Stanton on Future's dodgy dealings - GTA4's [10] bought

[Venom]

You said Rockstar were dodgy. How, specifically?
Direct intimidation plus massive ad budget. Simple.
Basically, whenever someone at Future tells you they don’t sell scores, they’re lying. I’ve seen it. They do.

Just give us the worst story on Future you have and get some rest!
Edge gave GTA IV [10] but the review didn’t
Bent as strawberry float. That’s Future for you

It seems there is a degree of bad feeling between this guy and Future.
But I would like to know more about this issue of ad budgets buying scores with CVG and EDGE. Rockstar would have known GTA IV was a triple AAA release. Would they have needed to buy a score or would a 10 be a bonus because of their ad budget?

[TheTurnipKing]

I think it's easy to forget how much of a technological leap GTA IV was at the time. The size of the city, the scale of the endeavor, the heavy use of Havok physics, even the attention to detail, like pedestrians with mobile phones.

By way of comparison, at the time of release there simply weren't many GTA style games to compare with in terms of scope and detail. I mean, I love Crackdown but technically it doesn't even compare. Even now there's not much out there to match it.

The worst you can say about GTA IV is that in some way it's not as "fun" as previous installments.

[Prototype]

Edge.

[melatonin]

Edge.

[SpaceJebus]

I think it's easy to forget how much of a technological leap GTA IV was at the time. The size of the city, the scale of the endeavor, the heavy use of Havok physics, even the attention to detail, like pedestrians with mobile phones.

By way of comparison, at the time of release there simply weren't many GTA style games to compare with in terms of scope and detail. I mean, I love Crackdown but technically it doesn't even compare. Even now there's not much out there to match it.

The worst you can say about GTA IV is that in some way it's not as "fun" as previous installments.

You are right that the scope was very impressive but the core game just wasn't as good. As you say it wasn't as fun as previous installments but for me that is a pretty big factor in a game score. I got bored of it very quickly especially with being called far too often on my mobile.

[TheTurnipKing]

I think it very much depends on how you look at it. For me the two GTA's that have stuck are Vice City and GTA IV.

I just didn't enjoy San Andreas at all, and I've barely played GTA 3.

GTA IV definately has it's irritations (the phone calls, as you say - though you can, IIRC, turn them off if you just want to arse around in the city), but what game doesn't have niggles? I found Niko to be a very enjoyable protagonist, however - certainly one of Rockstar's best.

Overall I was very impressed with GTA IV. I'd probably play it a lot more if it wasn't for it being a GFWL game. Whether that should be enough to net it a 10 is clearly up for debate, but I think it is still one of the greatest examples of the free-roaming city games, and one that actually took a surprising number of chances - the in-game menu's being integrated into the mobile phone interface for example.

[Venom]

Mags and websites might feel under pressure. Whenever a big game is released the fanboys and regular gamers check the review scores to see if they have been graded 'correctly.' Anything that is outside of the average and that mag/website/reviewer suffers a torrent of abuse.

Sometimes the words can back up an atypical score. Sometimes they don't.

[bear]

Considering PCGamer ran an editorial years ago slamming Rockstar for not giving them review code of Vice City unless they were guaranteed high scores its sadly plausible that they "bought" the Edge 10 for GTAIV.

[KK]

About strawberry floating time somebody did this.

[7256930752]

I think it's easy to forget how much of a technological leap GTA IV was at the time. The size of the city, the scale of the endeavor, the heavy use of Havok physics, even the attention to detail, like pedestrians with mobile phones.

By way of comparison, at the time of release there simply weren't many GTA style games to compare with in terms of scope and detail. I mean, I love Crackdown but technically it doesn't even compare. Even now there's not much out there to match it.

The worst you can say about GTA IV is that in some way it's not as "fun" as previous installments.

Agree 100%. I loved San Andreas but think Rockstar made the right choice on winding in the 'silly'.

[Tineash]

Silly or serious, GTAIV is dull to play.

[KK]

Probably not the man to ask, but anyway - who/what killed off Nintendo Gamer?
Lee Nutter. Genuine moron.

I find this absolutely astounding. He did edit the appallingly bad PSW, but I would have thought he'd be someone that would have fought the corner to save Nintendo Gamer.

EDGE's reputation has just gone to hell in a hand basket though.

[TheTurnipKing]

Silly or serious, GTAIV is dull to play.

Spoken like a man who's never been catapulted off a bridge on a moped and landed on train tracks below.

[$ilva $hadow]

Been saying it since Day 1 that reviews and previews from the big guys are not to be trusted.


Oscar worthy script? In GTA4? Get the strawberry float out. Every review on GTA4 was the biggest bullshit tripe ever. GTA4 had the worst single player in the entire series, fetch quests and stalk-wait-kill quests and that's it. Complete utter garbage for what all the reviews praised it for.

It's no surprise really, just vindication really, especially since most of the GRcaders who jizz themselves over games like Dishonoured (clearly getting 10/10 and 9/10 scores due to ad revenue related pressure as well as publisher pressure) are the ones who say that there's none of that going on in the industry.

[$ilva $hadow]

Silly or serious, GTAIV is dull to play.

Spoken like a man who's never been catapulted off a bridge on a moped and landed on train tracks below.

GTA4 is an absolute gem of a game, but not for anything the reviews said it was for. GTA4 is the dullest piece of gooseberry fool I had ever played, until I got a PC that could display more than four NPCs on screen and see further than five metres down the road to actually cause havoc. It's an excellent multiplayer sandbox playground to fool around in, but it still controls like dogshit and singleplayer is horrendous.

[KK]

I know, on OXM 360's first issue, the Microsoft games were scored high by management, but it never happened again.

There were no reviews in Issue 1, so I presume he's talking about #2. Someone needs to ask him about that Perfect Dark Zero review by that reviewer that seemingly didn't exist.

Well I'm glad after strawberry float knows how many year we're finally getting some of these blatant shenanigans cleared up...

[Memento Mori]

It's no surprise really, just vindication really, especially since most of the GRcaders who jizz themselves over games like Dishonoured (clearly getting 10/10 and 9/10 scores due to ad revenue related pressure as well as publisher pressure) are the ones who say that there's none of that going on in the industry.

Have you played Dishonored?

[TheTurnipKing]

Silly or serious, GTAIV is dull to play.

Spoken like a man who's never been catapulted off a bridge on a moped and landed on train tracks below.

GTA4 is an absolute gem of a game, but not for anything the reviews said it was for. GTA4 is the dullest piece of gooseberry fool I had ever played, until I got a PC that could display more than four NPCs on screen and see further than five metres down the road to actually cause havoc. It's an excellent multiplayer sandbox playground to fool around in, but it still controls like dogshit and singleplayer is horrendous.

Actually, it's a fair amount of fun as a singleplayer sandbox too. The missions I'm not bothered about, but the AI and physics results in some genuinely unpredictable moments of carnage - even on console.

And Four Leafed Clover is a great mission by any standards, whether alone or in co-op. But especially in co-op.

[$ilva $hadow]

It's no surprise really, just vindication really, especially since most of the GRcaders who jizz themselves over games like Dishonoured (clearly getting 10/10 and 9/10 scores due to ad revenue related pressure as well as publisher pressure) are the ones who say that there's none of that going on in the industry.

Have you played Dishonored?

That's exactly how it starts.

"have you played this game that was awarded 10/10 on hype alone? The reviews which were embargoed until release?"

No I haven't played it, neither have you, and it's not worth 10/10 for sure. Even from reading the RPS discussion you can see they don't think so either. Almost all of the reviews are going to be pressured for higher scores than the game is really worth.

Buy the game at full price and once the hype dies down I'm sure everyone will start picking at the reviews.

[Prototype]

Edge.

I know Rik is reading this and just dying to post.